Until now. Because the last secret she shared turned her into a social outcast—and nearly got someone killed.

Now
Chelsea has taken a vow of silence—to learn to keep her mouth shut, and
to stop hurting anyone else. And if she thinks keeping secrets is hard,
not speaking up when she's ignored, ridiculed and even attacked is
worse.

But there's strength in silence, and in the new friends
who are, shockingly, coming her way—people she never noticed before; a
boy she might even fall for. If only her new friends can forgive what
she's done. If only she can forgive herself."

My Two Cents:

Oh,
Hannah Harrington, you've done it again. I loved Harrington's Saving
June so I would have already have been excited about this book but the
fact that this book is affiliated with the "Love is Louder" movement
made me even more excited. "Love is Louder" is a worldwide movement
supporting anti-bullying efforts. This organization is absolutely
amazing and they do some really wonderful work.

Good causes
aside, this is a really good book. Chelsea Knot starts out as the exact
type of person I did not like in high school. She has made a name for
herself as the school gossip. She cannot keep a secret for anything.
Eventually this inability to keep her mouth shut gets her into major
trouble. All of the people that she thought she could count on as
friends totally turn their backs on her. In fact, not only do these
so-called friends turn their backs on her, they start bullying her
really, really badly. Many people would crack under the amount of
pressure that she is under. I know that at her age, I would have totally
cracked. I had the good fortune to just sort of get along with everyone
in high school but I know that bullying would have really upset me.
Chelsea takes it almost as a deserved punishment or some sort of penance
for what she felt she did wrong. She is totally alone. Eventually I
came to like Chelsea. After she realizes that spilling secrets was not
the way to keep friends, she seemed like a much better person.

As
with Saving June, I loved Harrington's writing in this book. She has a
real hand for writing great characters. I fell in love with Asha and
Sam. All of her characters seem really realistic. I also really liked
Noah. He's definitely a person that we should all strive to be like. In
one part of the story, he says something about how love is much harder
than hate but love is worth it, which is so true. It is easy to hate
something but it is harder to love something that you dislike. Sometimes
in life, we have to embrace the things that we hate in order to make
life better. Harrington also has a great hand for writing good
conversations. The characters and the conversations are both stand outs
to me in this book.

I think that especially in Young Adult
fiction, the messages that books give us can be really important.
Speechless is definitely one of those books that has a great message
while just being an all around great story. I am hopeful that more
people will read this book and take heed of the lesson that it is trying
to share.

8 comments:

Ooh, I've never heard of the Love is Louder movement (although I remember supporting similar causes in school). What a cool premise. I'll definitely be interested in reading this! Thanks for sharing :)

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